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archived stories

Santa Makes an Early Stop at OEST

The holiday celebrations got underway early at OEST this year with an early visit from Santa Claus on December 12th! Santa and his Elf provided a lot of holiday cheer and helped get the office into the holiday spirit. Of course the highlight of Santa’s visit was when he handed out gifts to all of the employee’s children. This year, we had a record 31 children in attendance for Santa’s visit. We hope that Santa and his Elf enjoyed the cookies and milk we left for him and that he shared some with the reindeer, too. Please come see us again next year, Santa!

OEST Black Bears Attend the Annual Fall Engineering Alumni Reception

Six OEST employees attended the Annual Fall Engineering Alumni Reception for the UMaine College of Engineering (COE) in November. OEST is proud to have over 15 UMaine graduates! The COE’s impressive growth is evidenced by their numerous accomplishments over the past year. These include:

• An additional 50 students joined the program, an increase of 20% in the size of the first year class. Total enrollment is now over 1400 students.
• In Oklahoma, students paddled their concrete canoe hard to win first place in the National Concrete Canoe Competition sponsored by the ASCE!
• The faculty raised funds to support research projects; raising $10 million in the last fiscal year, which averages out to approximately $200,000 per full-time faculty – the highest of all New England land grant colleges.
• The University of Maine’s Advanced Engineered Wood Composites Center won the Best of Show and the Peoples’ Choice Award from the American Composites Manufacturers Association and netted $4 million in funding from the Defense Appropriation Bill.
• The Forest Bioproducts Research Institute (FBRI), a 2 million gallon pilot plant that produces ethanol and other chemicals, brought in an additional $15 million funding.

OEST employees pictured from left to right: Andy Masella ’06, Civil Engineering; Samantha Perkins ‘04, Civil Engineering; Adam Greenlaw ‘04, Structural Engineering; Justin Desjarlais ’07, Structural Engineering, Sheena Bitetti ’06, Civil Engineering; and Greg Norton ’07 Civil Engineering.

OEST Employees Participate in the Reach the Beach Relay

Four OEST employees participated in the longest distance running relay race in the United States in September. The Reach the Beach Relay consists of teams (with up to 12 team members) that rotate through 36 transition areas as they cover the approximate 200 mile distance of the race. The race starts in Franconia, NH and ends in Hampton Beach, NH.

Bruce Goodwin, Electrical Engineer; Dave Libby, Structural Engineer; Christa Miller Shelley, Structural Intern; and Calen Colby, Structural Engineer, participated with 7 other runners from Bath Iron Works to form a team called “Running Aground”. The team had two support vans to carry runners and supplies and the runners averaged approximately 17 miles over the continuous two-day race.